I know that some of you are, the real question is whether any of you feel like sharing your experience. Of course, I’d be grateful for input from the folks who have served, or have served as well, but particularly about how your parents helped, or could’ve helped more.
My son is a high school sophomore. He’s bright, but not a motivated student. In a frank discussion about how neither his father nor I are sitting on a big pile of college money he piped up that he thinks he’ll join the military and go to college on the GI bill. He actually used that phrase. Do they even still call it that?
I have heard (not from a citable source) that soldiers don’t really end up able to pay for their whole degree that way.
Besides that, I’m really not sure it would be a good fit. Setting aside my own maternal “he’s going to end up in harm’s way” anxiety, I have some concerns. He hasn’t fixed on a branch of the service, and I don’t know too much about any of them, but just from TV and movies I’ve gathered that there’s a whole lot of order following and chain of command involved. He is, as I’ve said, smart, also funny, kind hearted, loyal, and lots of other wonderful qualities. He does not, however, take well to being told what to do. I cannot think of a time when I’ve asked or told him to do something that he didn’t immediately ask “why?”
What about after their service? There is a lot of reporting right now about how underserved veterans are. My mother-in-law tells horror stories of what corners have to be cut at the VA hospital where she spent her career. On the other hand, my uncle who is Vietnam vet, has nothing but good things to say about the care he’s been receiving at a different VA hospital. Are there jobs for returning vets?
I’d be grateful for any sort of real life experiences you’re willing to share. What are the pros? The cons? I think what I’m after is to be steered towards the resources that will let me help him make the best choice for him. Maybe it really is just the thing for him. I just don’t want him to enlist thinking it’s an easy road to college only to find out it’s not. He hasn’t fixed on a particular career, but he’s always been very good at and engaged by building activities. His Intro to Engineering teacher sent me an email that said he ought to pursue engineering in college - He gets As in that class because it interests him. The teacher was surprised to learn my son had flunked math and science in the first quarter because he seems like such a good student in his class.
Well, the “good” news is that if he decides to enlist, he goes through a lot of training before he goes into real service, and he’ll have PLENTY of time to figure out whether he can handle the whole “When I say ‘jump’, you say ‘How high?’” thing.
While I think it’s true that we don’t treat our ‘veterans’ as well as maybe we should, there are a LOT of categories of ‘veteran’ and some do better than others - I’m not an expert, but I think the ones we are serving the least well are probably the ones who deserve the most, which is to say, the ones who were really badly injured and/or traumatized in combat, possibly quite a while ago now. That’s measured against, for example, the category that one of my friends falls into - he enlisted after college, did a few years in the Middle East essentially “Between wars” over there, and then mustered out debt free, and I don’t think he’s ever regretted going into the army for an instant.
So I realize I’m not being very helpful here, but I guess what I’m trying to say is “there are a lot of variables”. =/
I will always encourage people to join. The whole “doesn’t like to follow orders” thing is usually overblown. Who likes to follow orders? No one. But we do, because that’s what the culture is and we understand why we’re doing it.
Pros–there are too many, but here are a few:
the services will pay for most if not all of the education, depending on how it is completed, whether tuition assistance while serving or, if he serves long enough, using the GI bill afterwards.
whatever service he joins will probably instill a good work ethic and make him more hireable once he gets out (the longer he’s in, the more interested the outside world will be in hiring him).
On top of that edge in hireability, he may learn a skill that is in demand on the outside (construction, aircraft maintenance/engines, that kind of thing), where more money can be made on the outside than made on the inside.
health care, gym facilities, lots of leave, lots of MWR programs to take advantage of
he’ll make lifelong friends and be exposed (in my opinion) to a better cadre of peers than he will on the outside
depending on what he does, he will probably see a lot of the world
Cons:
he’ll have to follow orders, but usually that comes in the form of just doing your job. Most people, even those in the sandbox, don’t get told every day to secure a bunker in the face of enemy fire.
will likely entail time away from home. But for a single guy, it’s a great thing.
there is a minimum commitment of years, depending on what he does. He’ll have to serve that out
completing a degree while serving (via tuition assistance) is a good deal, but hard–he’ll do it on top of doing his day job. It will take motivation.
can potentially be dangerous. But, again, to me this is a good thing. I’m probably more at risk overall here on the highways in the states than I was in the sandbox.
IANA parent, nor was I ever in the military. (I was going to join the Navy, but a sporting injury and a car wreck in high school put the kibosh on that.) I grew up a ‘Navy brat’, and used to work on an Air Force base.
I’ve come across sailors, airmen, soldiers, and Marines in my life. Among the enlisted ranks, there seem to be two types: One type is… Well, let’s just say that they are not from the socio-economic class around which I’m comfortable. Many of them seem fairly uneducated, obsessed with guns (Note: I am a gun owner, but not ‘obsessed’, if you follow), and seem to have joined just to play with weapons or because it was expected of them or they couldn’t find any other work. The other type did fairly well in school and see military service as an opportunity to improve themselves. (It goes without saying – but I’m saying it anyway – that Service to Country is also a strong incentive for both types.) When I was at the AFB the enlisted personnel with whom I came in contact were quite intelligent, and motivated to further their education. My SO joined the Army and became a Warrant Officer helicopter pilot. I think part of her motivation was to prove to people who said she couldn’t do it that she could. My dad tried to join the Army after the attack on Pearl Harbor. (They sent him home because he was a few years too young.) He enlisted in the Army just at the end of WWII, then enlisted in the Navy and rose to the rank of Lieutenant (O-3) before retiring.
ISTM that the opportunities are there if the person is interested. As far as basic training, I can’t speak to that from experience, but it sounds like learning how to ‘play the game’. But yeah, there’s a lot of following orders. Kind of like the real world, only you can’t just quit and find another job.
The Navy enlisted people I’ve known seem to look on the Navy as a job that they did, and now they’re doing something else. The Air Force people seemed to aim more for Engineering or other technical fields. The SO became a paralegal, a phlebotomist, worked in a couple of factories, and is now an RN with a BS.
If you’re worried about him getting into harm’s way, maybe point him toward the Air Force or the Navy.
My daughters are too young to even think about it and have health issues that would probably keep them out anyway. But I have served for 24 years as of next month, both fulltime active duty and then the National Guard. I do not regret any of it.
To address a couple of your issues:
I have some service related injuries. Nothing major, bad knees. I have never had a complaint about the VA or any of my care. But my experience is limited.
As for the college assitance, right now it is the best it has ever been. Look into the Post 911 GI Bill. It really is a good deal. Much better than the Montgomery GI Bill I had when I got off active duty.
My son did six years in the Army National Guard, including a year in Iraq. In terms of paying for his education, it was really good. And he is currently employed in a job that he got because of his experience in the military and doing quite well at it (include several paragraphs of absolutely shameless bragging here). So there are jobs for returning vets, at least in some areas.
The whole “not good at following orders” thing is kind of overblown - the military is very good at training people to follow orders and do their job right.
All I would add is not to sign until the recruiter puts it in writing.
This is spot on. Few people in the military have to worry about limited upward mobility. The most motivated members create a good name for themselves and opportunities open up because their chain of command will support their goals. I’ve seen plenty of rising stars put in officer/LDO/Warrant packages and get picked up. The average quasi-motivated member will probably promote to E-6 or E-7 and get out or retire. And you don’t have to have been particularly motivated in high school–many people get into the military and bloom.
If your son is at all interested, it doesn’t hurt to have him take the ASVAB and talk to some recruiters.
If it weren’t for the MGIB I would not have been able to go to college. There’s just no way.
But, I also did two tours in Iraq where I should have died, have had friends killed, took over a month to reserve a slot with the VA’s councilor, etc. It isn’t all fun and games.
Three of my step-sons have served in the military and my son-in-law is still on active-duty in the navy.
One step-son served five years in the navy as a corpsman, entering right out of high school. Upon leaving the navy, he entered college under the post-9/11 bill and completed his degree with little or no out of pocket cost.
My twin step-sons joined the National Guard after high school and began college. The guard paid for some of their education; I can’t remember the details. One of the twins joined ROTC while in college and remained in the guard as well. He graduated from college having paid no money for his education. He recently left the army as a captain and got a good job in private industry.
For all of them, from their points of view and mine, serving in the military was a positive experience as well as a good way to pay or defray the cost of college. They all considered staying in until retirement but chose other options.
My son-in-law entered the navy after completing law school, so paying for education was not a primary consideration. The navy did pay 100% of the cost of an MS degree he got at Georgetown while he was serving in DC. He is a lieutenant commander now and trying to decide whether to stay in or get out.
One step-son did a one year tour in Afghanistan doing dangerous duty. The navy corpsman was never on a ship, and was stationed in Newport, RI and Catania, Sicily while he was in. My son-in-law has done brief tours in Iraq and Afghanistan doing office work.
Thanks for the responses. I appreciate your input. I’m struggling with my own knowledge that I got some pretty bad guidance at his age. I want to do better for him than my own parents did for me, but don’t necessarily have any better information than they did.
I want him to have a life he enjoys, but also with more security than I’ve had or been able to provide for him.
When I mentioned him not taking orders well it’s not that he’d refuse to do what he’s told. He likes to analyze things and come up with a creative (and often needlessly complicated) way to do tasks. It’s never a straight line from “Do this” to the thing being done.
As mentioned, this is something the military is really good at teaching. If you and he decide that, otherwise, the military makes sense in terms of his goals, I wouldn’t let this stop him. He isn’t going to like how they teach him not to do that, but nobody does.
Air Force - a very long time ago! I found it to be a positive experience. I learned a lot and grew up a lot. Used the GI bill to pay for school. It’s really a great way for someone to break loose from the family “stage” and learn to depend on themselves. Yes, there is always the potential for danger or harm - goes with the territory.
He needs to keep in mind that as someone right out of high school, he will be joining the military as an E-1, which, as any DI can tell you, is lower than whale shit. With that in mind, he needs to pick a service that will put him into a trade school right out of basic training (assuming he has the smarts to score high on the tests). The best ones for that are the Navy and the Air Force. Otherwise, he runs a very high risk of going to the infantry, where he won’t learn much more than how to kill people and die.
Before signing any contract, he needs to research the different specialties in each service to find one that he’d like to try for. In fact, he needs to identify several, since first choice is not always available. When I joined the Navy, they had a book that described all of the specialty ratings. That information is available online now. He should also keep in mind that the military may put him in whatever training they feel there is greatest need for, and not necessarily where he wants to be. If he can take the tests in advance of enlisting, he may be able to be guaranteed an “A” School, or even have a guarantee of what part of the service he gets assigned to, i.e., aviation, construction, etc (I referring to the Navy here). Whatever guarantees he gets, he needs to make sure they are in the contract before he signs it.
My nephew is currently at Parris Island. He will graduate from the Marine basic training in March.
He is similar to your son in that he was very bright, but unmotivated. He had a free ride to college due to a family trust (not from my side of the family, dammit!), and dropped out after a year. He worked for a grocery store for a while, and kind of drifted.
After a year of that, he said to my mother (his grandmother) that he didn’t like the way his life was going, and decided to join the Marines. This was last winter, and it took almost a year to get in. During that time, he worked out with a group of other candidates, lost sixty pounds, and pretty much got his life together before entry.
This is something of a cliche, but it can happen. Your mileage, of course, may vary.
If he takes the ASVAB he will be able to tell whether he can have his pick of jobs, or if he will be relegated to a grunt job.
Family story…2003…On a whim, my son went into a recruiting office on a college campus when he was visiting his sister at her school. He scored very high and the recruiter told him he could have his choice of jobs; the recruiter steered him towards being a medic. He got a commitment for Army Airborne Range Medic training, and enlisted. He had it written into his contract how much he would get for education expenses–not sure if they do that today, as this was at the start of the GW. Yes–he had to pass all of the physical and technical training and did so successfully. He is thankful for the AS for turning his life around. Yes, he did 2x tour in the ME, one of them very dangerous–both of them arduous.
We knew he was a smart kid, but never really applied himself during the formal education process. He was 23 at the time and just working minimum wage jobs such as fast food. He was a good kid, but just sort of bobbing along. He says that the Army taught him discipline, team work and attention to detail. [ahem!]
Ten years later now, he got out, went to college and graduated with a 3.8 in Microbiology/Biochem and was just made a senior manager at a GM grain producer.
Story for the OP: said he “could not believe how lazy all of his classmates were in college–all they complain about is that they don’t have time to study–that is because all they want to do is sit around and get drunk on weekends and at night. All these kids should have to do military service before college.”
The Army worked for him. As a parent, to watch the transformation was stunning.
I have a son-in-law who is currently serving in the USAF (he must be in about year 8 or so). In addition, both of my parents were in the USAF–my mom quit when she got pregnant with me, and my father shortly thereafter. Many years after my parents divorced, my mom married a guy who was in the USAF, and he eventually retired from there.
If you’d like to know something specific about our experiences, feel free to ask or PM me.
BTW, he just got his first paycheck and it was way more than he could ever have made if he’d gotten a job out of high school–and he’s still in BMT. He plan on letting the AF put him through college (while he’s still in). He knows that aside from going into school loan debt, that’s about the only way he will be able to afford college. (And he knows his future is VERY limited if he doesn’t have a college degree.)
With Hallboy being in only Week 4 of USAF’s BMT, I’ve had an opportunity to talk to him a handful of times. He sounds exactly like himself only STRONGER and more self assured. Don’t get me wrong–our phone conversations aren’t all roses and sunshine. Many of those conversations have been about how difficult it’s been for him to adjust, what he’s learning, what he likes and doesn’t like, but with each conversation, he’s sounded amazing and positive, like he has something to look forward–as in the future, not just next weekend.
During several conversations, he’s mentioned how his MTI’s are tough but “want us to succeed and do well”. I was somewhat stunned to hear this, even after I knew he’d been “put on his face” (ie. made to do physical activity when he made an error) by a MTI. Any other 18 year old kid, I’d expected them to say what an ass the MTI’s are, but to hear Hallboy talk about the experience made me realize he’s no longer an 18 year old kid, but is becoming an 18 year old man.
Transformation stunning? That transformation starts IMMEDIATELY and stunning doesn’t even begin to cover it.
Pretty much this. I’m a new enlistee(go to Air Force basic training in a few months), but I’ve spent the better part of the past two years asking anyone I know who is part of or connected to the military their opinions on the matter, and almost everything I’ve heard has been, on the whole, positive.
As long as your son is fully aware of what he’s getting into, he’ll do fine. Just make sure he looks up his job options, keeps his mind open, and really considers the life choice he’s making. Not a single vet I’ve spoken to says that life in the military is easy. But I’ve only had one(out of dozens) who told me it wasn’t worth it, in the end.
And trust me, if your boy’s as smart as his grades say, the military could use him. They have plenty of guys who can shoot a gun. But what they really need are guys who can operate satilites, construct buildings/bridges and use computers.
Keep in mind that he can attend college while he serves out his enlistment term without ever tapping into his GI Bill. If he serves 4 years, he should have at least 3 years of college completed before he gets out, plus all the technical training and experience. The Army will pay for his Tuition, and FAFSA will cover his books.
Then he can use the GI Bill to finish off his 4th year, and pay for his Masters Degree. The Post 911 GI Bill will not only pay for his classes and books, it will pay for his apartment. It’s not a bad deal at all.
Even in the Army, he doesn’t have to be combat arms. Even if he does deploy, he can still knock out a year of college while he’s over there like most soldiers do. The majority of soldiers do not leave the wire, do not patrol, and do not actively fight. Sure there is a danger of a random incoming round killing him, but that is like getting struck by lightning. It’s not something you should really worry about.
I would say DO IT.